Towards a Wikipedia/Linkedin-like system for better exploitation of the results of research #new #system #research

Towards a Wikipedia/Linkedin-like system for better exploitation of the results of research

(by A. PIRLET, Expert in Standardization, *)

It is common knowledge that the results of publicly funded or co-funded research are insufficiently disseminated and above all insufficiently exploited, therefore a lack of « efficiency » in that mechanism of supporting research, especially applied research.

The project

The idea is to have a permanent system where people can continuously consult the information and retrieve it, in relation to completed research projects, but also report on the actual use they have been able to make from the results of these projects. In a first stage, it would be wise to start with EU co-funded research, in a specific field (like environment for example).

The European Commission manages the (co) funding system for the applied EU research and should therefore organize and manage the relevant information system on dissemination & exploitation. The idea is to have an interactive system, web based. Project by project, you would find basic information about the results of the research projects in one column, but also in another column « unvalidated » statements of exploitation of these results, independently of the field of exploitation !, and finally a column with « validated » information, with validation done by a set of designed persons from the European Commission. Such a system would cost some financial ressources but would be less costly and far more effective than paying dearly some private consultants to do « one off » analyses ! Of course, we know that the devil hides in the details and some restrictions might be necessary to make the system work. This concerns in particular the « return » flow of information. One could imagine that people willing to comment would be required to register and could provide up to a certain level (40 per year?) of comments free of charge, and extra comments for a fee…

The implementation

The presented system needs to be created, operated and managed by the European Commission. The easiest manner is to make an extension of the CORDIS system, since CORDIS contains already information on the outputs of research projects (co)financed by the EU. Let us evaluate the cost of creating that extension to a maximum of 200k€. The cost of operating and maintaining the system, including the validation part, could be evaluated to a maximum of 600k€/year. In view of the large added value of the system, this is money well spent. In a latter stage, better links should be created between that platform and the OpenAire platform.

An Advisory Board could be set up, in order to suggest continuous improvements.